So what defines right and left?

Discussion in 'Political Opinions & Beliefs' started by Pixie, Jul 24, 2022.

  1. FatBack

    FatBack Well-Known Member

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    Don't quit your day job because you make a terrible mind reader.

    If it was up to you, you would just have the government give everyone "free" tickets to the Ball game.

    Government is not the answer for everything.
     
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  2. fmw

    fmw Well-Known Member

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    They need to be moved away from federal government. Some should go to the states, some to the private sector and some to the trash can. In my vision the populists, whoever they are, will have to DEMAND things from their state.
     
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  3. fmw

    fmw Well-Known Member

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    The federal government's role isn't to do for people. It's role as defined by the constitution is to defend the nation, deal and treat with other nations, maintain a stable currency, resolve interstate disputes and, oddly, run a postal service. Everything else goes to the states. The monstrosity our federal government has become results from analysis of the constitution, not the words of the constitution. The purpose of the constitution is to define how government should work and to limit its power. We, the people, have allowed it to fail.
     
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  4. Rampart

    Rampart Banned

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    a two dimensional line is not sufficient to describe american politics, but i don't see how we can achieve a multiparty system with this constitution. i am absolutely in favor of the new deal and great society programs.

    i try to be polite and respectful of others (is the golden rule really not constitutional) but there are only 2 genders (which may not be so clear cut that everyone can be defined by plumbing or genetics.) but what does that have to do with adult concerns economics or defense?

    i am primarily an anti war environmentalist and i don't care how big government is as long as what we have is efficient and not corrupt, available by communication with knowledgeable honest civil servants.
     
  5. VotreAltesse

    VotreAltesse Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    On a global way, even if the left and the right wing exist, they're both blurry notions, at the border of being completely useless.

    I think that one of the best way I saw political ideas defined is along a triangle with three different poles : liberty, equality and order. Equality is more the dominant idea at the left, order at the right. Liberty itself is by it nature more a wild horse.

    I would say that the right wing is the one who try to preserve as much as possibly to keep the society in it current order, to bring back an order from the past or to correct somethings of the current model without deeply changing it, the left itself would be more about changing radically society at is it.

    The question is what does it mean excellence ? Do we speak of the excellence of someone whose parents paid the best teachers, who didn't had to work while studying, who was cut from negative influences because he could grew in a protected environment ? Is it the excellence of the individual or the circumstances he was born in. There is in that case two definition of excellency, one more left winged who believe that the community through the state should tend to erase the circumstances of birth, a more right winged who is more fatalist.

    I tend to personnaly like the motto of the french revolution : liberty, equality, brotherhood.
    There is an obvious tension between liberty and equality. At which moment equality determine liberty, and at which moment liberty undermine equality. There is an answer in "brotherhood". Without brotherhood, both liberty and equality are just mere egoism and blind self-interest, but ultimately, neither freedom or equality isn't possible with brotherhood.
    That motto, the one of France and Haiti, became unfortunately an empty slogan, but it's still full of hope.
     
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  6. David Landbrecht

    David Landbrecht Well-Known Member

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    Does everyone miss the fact that the people outside the fence are profiting from what the people inside are doing and have paid for? In other words, why is there a fence?
     
  7. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    You'll need to provide a lot more information for an honest assessment of where you are on the political spectrum.

    Being a democrat isn't equal to being a communist.

    If you are for

    1. The right of privacy and bodily autonomy (pro choice)
    2. Universal Heath Care, view affordable health care as a right
    3. Sensible gun laws
    4. Want more democracy ( majority rule in democracy for electing the president)
    5. Improved access to the ballot
    6. Fair redistricting
    7. A liberal Supreme Court, 5/4 in favor of liberal justices or adding justices to achieve a similar balance ( you are against extreme right or left).
    8. Making becoming a US Citizen easier than it is now ( because we have labor shortages )
    9. Enforcing anti-trust laws and breaking up the 'too big to fail' banks and insurance companies and more pro small business and regulated big business.
    10. Pro union ( but anti - corruption )
    11. Making Puerto Rico a state ( if they want it) or any other US Territory that wishes to become a state.
    12. A federal baseline on minimum wage set to the rate of the least expensive state.
    13 A progressive tax (and no tax below a threshold and a negative tax for the working poor)
    14 Legalization of cannabis ( though I support the legalization of all drugs, with restrictions on narcotics)

    YOu can be anti-mandates on vaccines and still be a liberal. I know, because I am.
    You can be anti-woke and still be a liberal, I know, because I am (specifically, agree that gender is based on biology, not 'psychology/sociology' though as a liberal, I respect other's desire to be referred to, in public, of the gender of their choosing, but inwardly, I cannot think it, I do it in public because it's not that big of a deal to me. If a transgendered female, who appears to me like a man in drag, if they ask me what I think, i will be honest, so I say to them, don't ask me if you don't want to know what I think).
    You can agree with conservatives that teaching children (by schools) on or before the 3rd grade including controversial political topics ( such as racism) is inappropriate on or below the 3rd grade

    You can agree with the above paragraph and still be a liberal democrat.
    You can disagree with much of the list items (regarding taxation, commerce and free enterprise) and be a conservative democrat.

    I disagree with the hard left who view the world through the 'you are either an oppressor or oppressed' lens, or that a man with a penis who wants to be female is a female just because he says so. I disagree with any extreme lefty who cannot answer the question 'what is a woman?' with a simple answer

    Actually, I do not believe in transgenderism, period. You are male or female and that is determined at birth. Intersex is an anomaly and doesn't change the fact.
    There are many shades of blue, but light blue is not red. There are many shades of red, but light red is not blue. However, if a transgender wants me to call him a 'her' in public, i will, and i do it to make peace with them, I do not want to fight, but they cannot change my opinion, inwardly. Are some souls born into the wrong body? yes, but that doesn't change your sex, that's just nature screwing with you, because it screws with all of us, in one way or the other, so welcome to the club, the TSes of the world are not special in that regard.
     
    Last edited: Jul 25, 2022
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  8. HonestJoe

    HonestJoe Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I generally find I'm called "left" when I question the opinion of a radical who considers themselves to be on the right and "right" when I question the opinion of a radical who considers themselves to be on the left. Given I'm neither and tend to question radicals regardless of what they're radical about it, I usually just ignore it.
     
  9. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    delete
     
    Last edited: Jul 25, 2022
  10. Pro_Line_FL

    Pro_Line_FL Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I never met anyone who would be 'left' according to that definition.
     
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  11. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    I am on the left and I believe in equality of opportunity and promoting excellence. But I don't buy the 'American exceptionalism' myth.

    Equality of outcome is communism, which I reject, because even in a communist world, it is a myth.
     
    Last edited: Jul 25, 2022
  12. Cybred

    Cybred Well-Known Member

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    Don't quit your day job because you make a terrible mind reader.

    Govt is the answer for things that cannot or should not be solved with the profit motive.
     
  13. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    Those are hard lefties. I wouldn't support such a thing. I believe in equality of opportunity, but we are not created equal, that's a myth.

    What 'equality of opportunity' means (to me) is that you have the right to apply to Juilliard, but you don't have the right to force Juillard to accept you if your talent doesn't fulfill their requirements.
     
  14. Cybred

    Cybred Well-Known Member

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    Govt's role is to do for people.
     
  15. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    YOur characterization of the left is the hard left. I don't support such things.

    To each his own, but God bless the child who's got his own, as the song goes.
     
  16. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    I agree. Reagan once said 'a rising tide lifts all boats' but he forgot to mention that not everyone as a boat. At the minimum, give those who do not have a boat a life preserver, and then we'll talk about it.
     
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  17. Pro_Line_FL

    Pro_Line_FL Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    That is not what "equality of opportunity" is about. Not everyone gets to be the quarterback in the football team, but everyone can get a chance to show that they are good enough. That's why they have tryouts.

    You don't need a boat to benefit from the "rising tide" aka good economy, because good economy benefits everyone, even those on welfare.

    JFK said it BTW, not Reagan.

    [​IMG]
     
    Last edited: Jul 25, 2022
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  18. Ddyad

    Ddyad Well-Known Member

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    A reality based political spectrum would stretch between the maximum achievable level of individual liberty on one end to totalitarianism on the other end.
     
  19. Condor060

    Condor060 Banned Donor

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    Really, Never heard of Affirmative action that requires hires based on their gender, race, sexuality, creed or nationality?
     
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  20. yardmeat

    yardmeat Well-Known Member

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    Outside the US, I've mostly seen left/right defined as relating to capitalism. Within the US, however, there are a lot of social issues that get bundled together and labelled left/right. I've literally been called a leftist (even a Marxist) for saying that Trump wasn't pro-free market enough. So, these days it seems like "left" is a word for anyone in the US who questions Donald Trump in any way . . . even though, as I've pointed out before, Trump relied SOLEY on a left leaning economics think tank when he was running. None of it makes sense.
     
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  21. independentthinker

    independentthinker Banned

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    What do you consider the left to be in the US?
     
  22. Noone

    Noone Well-Known Member

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    The Constitution also defines the Federal Government AND it's powers. That's inconvenient for your paradigm but true.
     
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  23. Ddyad

    Ddyad Well-Known Member

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    Yes, Trump has always been a progressive liberal.
     
  24. ButterBalls

    ButterBalls Well-Known Member

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    Well as close as you can get without insulting the real communist! At least they have the courage to defend and admit to their beliefs ;)
     
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  25. garyd

    garyd Well-Known Member

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    Then quit defending leftist talking points. The modern left is not Marxist, it is totalitarian. The essential totalitarian nature of the left has been on display since Robespierre.

    Everyone is in favor of human against misogyny and for equal opportunity.

    Now if you think telling a guy he isn't a girl and can't be a girl is misogyny we have a problem first in my view to believe that the only requirement to be female is merely stating so it is you who are the misogynist.

    In a similarly vein if you think equal opportunity requires limiting opportunities for others then again we have a problem. But the problem exists because you have chosen to define equal opportunity as it's opposite.

    There is and in fact cannot be a right to terminate a human being save in self defense, and the death penalty is self defense against those who have demonstrated such an animal blood lust that the only to save other from their continuing evil actions is to execute them.
     
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